Star Trek: Endeavour - Book 2 - Shattered Realities
by Dwilt
Summary: Captain Benson and the crew of the Endeavour find themselves in the past but in a different reality, sent there by the enity known as Q. Already forced into violating the Temporal Prime Directive, the crew of the Endeavour must find a way home. Rated M due to language. Reviews welcome.
1. Chapter 1, A New Reality

Q stood there, smug as ever. Alona was still startled to find him standing on her bridge, she wasn't expecting this. Other captains logs began to float through her head about him. Irrational, irresponsible, impulsive, did not care about anyone, did anything he wanted. One point he wanted to "mate" with Admiral Janeway. Now, here he was, standing on her bridge with a shit-eating grin on his face. She knew she couldn't harm him, but if she could, she probably would have at least knocked that fucking grin off his face. "What have you done to my ship?" Alona demanded.

"Come now captain, what makes you think I had anything to do with the particular predicament your ship and crew are currently in?" Q said.

"Well, for one thing, you're standing on my bridge. I'd say that alone raises questions"

Q snickered, "Fair enough, well, Captain, lets talk in private" he said, then snapped his fingers. In a flash Q and Alona were standing in the middle of a desert, she didn't know which one or what planet she was on. After glancing around she settled her gaze back on Q.

"Excellent! Tell me Captain, do you consider yourself truly human? I mean after all, you are pretty, well, not what one would call a normal human" Q said.

"Yes, I consider myself human, I have been just genetically...adjusted"

"Tisk, tisk, Captain, isn't that illegal?"

"What I am doesn't matter, tell me Q, what do you want with me and my ship?"

Q sighed, "So serious, just like Kathy was when I first met her" he shrugged and continued, "I want to tell you a little story, its about how a single Romulans revenge created a new reality. You remember the supernova in the Romulus system? That supernova was glorious, even though it was what you might call man-made"

"Get to the point" Alona said. Wait...man-made? What the hell does that mean?

"Impatient are we? Fine, as you are aware, Ambassador Spock tried to intercept the supernova with Red Matter"

"Yes the Narada and the Ambassadors ship, the Jellyfish, were both sucked into the black hole that Red Matter created and were destroyed"

A flash happened and they were in mid-1800s garb in an old classroom, Q was holding a pointing stick and a piece of chalk.

"Ah my dear, that's where you are wrong, you see, that wasn't quite the outcome of that particular black hole. The Red Matter created black hole, combined with the energies of the supernova created a portal, to the past. Particularly straight into the path of an old Federation starship which a very famous Starfleet captain was born on"

Alona thought for a moment, then it donned on her, "Kirk, James Kirk"

"Correct, I guess that genetically enhanced brain of yours isn't so bad off. You're a bit slow on the uptake though, by now Jean-Luc or Kathy would be handling this situation. Anyway, the portal was that was created was investigated by the U.S.S. Kelvin, well the first through the portal was Nero and the Narada, so in Nero's rage, he destroyed the Kelvin. Well actually, George Kirk rammed it into the Narada, but that's splitting hairs. Regardless, baby James and Winona Kirk managed to escape on a shuttle before George died in his blaze of glory.

"But that didn't stop Nero. As he was pulling the wreckage of the Kelvin from his ship, Nero was even more angry, he drifted into Klingon space, and was captured. After a few years he and his crew escaped, got to the Narada and destroyed an entire Klingon fleet. From there he waited, 18 of your years he waited in this timeline, waiting for Ambassador Spock to come through, and when he did, he captured the Jellyfish and the good Ambassador. Afterwards he blamed Spock for what happened to Romulus and the death of his wife, then vowed to take something precious from Spock. After exiling Spock to a nearby planet while on his way to Vulcan, he took the Red Matter, drilled a hole to the core of Vulcan and dropped some into the core, destroying the planet, then set course for Earth to do the same thing. Fortunately, James Kirk is as resourceful and lucky in this reality as he was where you came from. He killed Nero using the Red Matter that he was going to use on Earth, but he also saved Ambassador Spock, in which Young Spock met the Ambassador.

"Now, here's the curious part. I expected this universe to explode in fire and death when those two met, but nothing happened. Intrigued, I looked into this reality further. Ah yes, Ally...may I call you that?" Q continued on a little bit but she had stopped focusing on him for a moment, she noticed he began to write on the nearby chalkboard.

Ambassador Spock is alive, let alone in this timeline. She supposed he had no means to get home and with Vulcan being destroyed she figured he could assume another name and help rebuild. She thought about it for a moment, Endeavour being in this reality could really damage the timeline, its been polluted enough but at the same time they could take Ambassador Spock back home to his proper reality.

"So, I came to this particular discovery, they are going to appear here in this reality, near this moment in time" Q finished. He looked at Alona.

"Have you been listening?" he demanded.

"I'm sorry, I am still a little stunned at what you have told me about this timeline. What was it you discovered?" Alona asked.

Figures, she wasn't paying attention. At least she was polite about it. Q sighed, "Ally, do you remember hearing about the Dominion Fleet that was supposed to reinforce the Dominion forces that disappeared while in the Wormhole?"

"Yes"

"They're going to appear here, apparently those entities in the Wormhole cannot contain them any longer and want to expel them to anywhere but DS9's front door. They're coming and soon"

"Why are you telling me this and why me?"

"Because I'm feeling generous and I like this reality and timeline, its spunky. The reason I chose you is because there might be some...oh, personal connections to this place you may find to be intriguing. Also because you trained under Kathy and she is a merciless primate, so, you should be worth something"

"Q, I am afraid we can't do anything. Our presence here can destabilize or even cause adverse effects on this timeline which has been polluted enough by Nero and Ambassador Spock. So, please, send us back" Alona thought of the Temporal Prime Directive. She should get Spock if shes going to leave though. His presence in this timeline could be polluting it.

"Yes, Yes, Temporal Prime Directive and all that. Trust me Captain, this timeline actually needs your help. And besides, I'll throw in a little incentive. One of a personal nature"

"I don't take bribes"

"Oh really? How about I show your ships doctor on how to cure your sterility. While you're here see if you can get Ambassador Spock to come with you and I will get you home faster. Tell me Ally, how would you like to be able to have a family? Don't hide it, I know you've wanted one for some time" Q said with a smile.

Alona squinted at him. He's trying to manipulate my emotions, I know it, but...having a family. Children. She shook her head. Its a bribe, I can't take it. Her mind shifted gears quickly, wait a second, a single Sovereign versus a Dominion Fleet? no way in hell we could survive against odds like that.

Q chuckled, "Only if you want to die, sure then, stand alone. My suggestion would be to improvise. I am sure you could get Starfleet to ready a fleet to intercept this incoming fleet" he said as if he read her mind.

"When will they be here?"

Q shrugged, "To me, time is irrelevant, however, to sate your primitive observation of time" He stuck his finger in his mouth then pulled it out and held it up as if he was finding the direction of the wind, "I'd say one of your years, perhaps two. These types of things you can never be sure of"

"Bullshit, you know. Besides, Starfleet can't even build a ship in that time"

"Ally, my dear, I love to say it but that's not my problem"

"Why don't you snap your fingers and stop all this from happening? After all, you like this reality and timeline"

Q laughed, "Where is the fun in that? Also, I would like to see how well trained the so called protégé of Kathy really is"

Alona sighed, "How do I know you're not lying to me, trying to get me to damage this already wounded reality and timeline?" she asked.

"I can do that on my own, I wouldn't need you or your help in doing that"

"Point taken. Fine, but I am not doing it for to satisfy your twisted games but to protect the people of this timeline. I take it that I can reveal that I am from the future?"

"I don't see how it could hurt, after all, Ambassador Spock is here. Who knows what he has revealed to people or how he has effected the timeline" Q said with a Mona Lisa smile.

"Just take me back to my ship, so I can get to work" Alona said, obviously she was getting irritated.

"Very well, remember, take the good Ambassador with you and I'll assist you in getting home faster and...regardless if you get him, I will help you with your genetic disability" Q held up his hand, "I know you don't accept bribes, call it a gift. Theres one more thing to do" Q snapped his fingers. A PADD appeared in his hand and he handed it over to Alona.

"You may need this my dear, Its some crucial information and your orders per Admiral Janeway" Q said.

"Per Admiral Janeway?" Alona asked as she took the PADD.

"I am a Q Ally, I can be anywhere I want, even two places at once. Enjoy the information on the PADD Captain, time to get to work. Ciao" Q snapped his fingers.

In a flash Alona was back on her bridge. She glanced around, gathering her bearings. Another flash and the lights came back online, the bridge watch began to hurry about, trying to find out what happened. All systems were reading normal, EPS conduits were operating normally, no fire, and no emergency shut down of the warp core. She sat down in her chair.

"What the status of that incoming Starfleet vessel?" Alona asked without missing a beat.

"The ship is the U.S.S. Bellerophon. she just dropped out of warp about 800,000 klicks off our port beam" Kim said, then added, "What did Q want Captain?"

"One thing at a time Harry, one thing at a time" Alona replied.

"What is the Bellerophon doing? She hailing us?" Alona asked, turning her attention back to the bridge.

"Not yet ma'am, sensors indicate shes charged weapons and her shields are up. Shall I raise our shields and charge weapons?" Viir'Keim asked.

"No Viir-Keim, but be ready to raise shields. In the mean time, I want a tactical analysis of this kind of Constitution-class vessel, I want to know if she can hurt us" Alona said.

"Their hailing us" Radis said.

"On screen" Alona said.

"Captain, if they find out we're from the future..." Radis began, Alona held up her hand silencing him.

"Commander, Ambassador Spock is here in this reality, Vulcan's been destroyed and that ship out there doesn't look like any Constitution-class that I know of. Now, On screen, that's an order" Alona said, looking at him.

"Aye, ma'am"

A face and shoulders appeared, a human, sitting in the Captains chair. He stood and took a step forward. Alona was taken aback. It was Nathan Taylor, Captain of the Kelvin back where she was from. At least it was the spitting image of him, probably a great, great, great grandfather.

"Endeavour, I am Jack Taylor, Captain of the Starfleet ship Bellerophon. We received your distress signal"

"We're being scanned" T'saal quietly said.

"Captain Taylor, I am Captain Alona Benson of the Federation starship Endeavour. We had a slight computer malfunction which caused our distress signal to be sent out. We're glad you were in the area and were able to respond but we're-"

"Captain, lets cut the horseshit. What kind of ship is that? Our scanners are picking up advanced weapon systems, phasers we've never seen or dreamed of existing, primary and secondary shielding, sensor palettes four times the size of a space stations sensor grid, an extensive communications relays. Are you part of Section 31?" Taylor said.

"Heh" she said. 'Straight to the point and doesn't fuck around' she thought. "I agree Captain, lets cut the horseshit. You see, the reason why you detected all this advanced technology is because we're not from here, well, this time anyway. We're from about 130 years into the future. We're here to intercept and destroy an enemy fleet and we're going to need Starfleets help to do it" Alona said.

'Better to throw all the cards out there' she thought. If Jack is anything like Nathan is, he'd hopefully understand. Kim looked at Alona, his brows furrowed. 'What the fuck is she doing?' Kim thought.

"Excuse me? 130 years into the future? I'm sorry Captain Benson, I have a hard time believing that" Taylor said.

Alona stood and took two paces forward, "Then Captain, explain Nero, explain the Red Matter that caused the destruction of Vulcan, explain the Narada" she said boldly.

"Classified information like that can be easily accessed by anyone with the proper authorization, Captain" Taylor replied.

"True, however, all I can tell you is this" Alona recounted the story Q had told her. Both crews were looking at their Captains.

"Now, in my time, since the Narada and the Jellyfish disappeared into a black hole, Red Matter has been outlawed throughout the Alpha Quadrant due to its destructive capabilities. It was rumored the Breen had fashioned a Red Matter Torpedo but those rumors proved to be unsubstantiated" she paused for a dramatic effect, "Also, you should consider the fact that I have charged my phasers and have had a lock on your warp core and bridge this entire time without you detecting it, I think is another significant factor that what I said is true" she finished.

"What?" Taylor said, then looked at one of his officers to confirm what Alona had said.

Viir-Keim looked at her and opened his mouth to say something but she glanced at him, he understood the look. Don't say anything. He entered a couple commands to get a weapons lock, but he didn't charge phasers, although made it look like he did. The officer Taylor looked at nodded, Taylors face changed from surprise to astonishment.

"Captain Taylor, if you'd like, we can beam you aboard and you can look around here for additional proof" Alona said.

"I don't think that will be necessary" Taylor said. He was still apprehensive.  
"Then I would like to invite you over for Dinner, we had an extensive hydroponics bay" Alona said. She had remembered that ships of this time still used food processors and food synthesizers vice replicators, it was also quite a request to invite another crew over for a meal, tradition dictated he would have to respond and a refusal can be considered very insulting. Also, a "real meal" is appealing enough. Taylor, looked at his shoes then back up at Alona, he glanced back at his bridge crew, then back.

"Very well Captain Benson, I suspect you'll give us a tour of your ship before the meal" he said.

"Naturally. In fact, if it makes you feel better Captain, your party can come armed" Alona said. Taylor just nodded.

"Lets make sure we're synced, according my chronometer, its 1439 hours, is that correct?" Alona asked.

"Yes Captain, we'll take our meal at around 1900 hours if that's ok with you"  
"Very well, we'll beam you over at 1730 for the tour"

"We'll see you then" Taylor said and ended the transmission.

"Daro, keep tabs on their outgoing message traffic, I want to know if their talking about us to anyone else. Also, have all senior staff meet in the conference room in 45 minutes" Alona said.

"Aye ma'am" Radis replied.

"Captain, the computer has finished its tactical analysis. Computer states that their shield system is a "Metaphysic" shield system, force-fields protect the bridge, life support, and main engineering. Its similar to the metaphasic shielding used back in the 23rd century captain. Also six ball turrent phaser banks capable of rapid fire phaser blasts on the saucer, three on the engineering hull, fore and aft photon launchers. Captain, if she fired on us, her torpedos would do the most damage. Her phasers wouldn't penetrate or do much damage to the shielding. If we didn't have shields up, the hull armor would absorb her phaser fire pretty well but I think her torpedos would be able to penetrate the armor. Bellerophons own defenses are no match for us ma'am, our phasers would be able to penetrate her shields in a couple shots. Our torpedos would-" Viir-Keim stopped as he glanced up to see Alona standing with her hands on her hips and her head cocked to one side.

"So you're saying we'd easily destroy her?"

"Yes ma'am"

"Good" She said with a smile, "At least we know we're not out gunned here. You know, I think even if we put a bunch of those Constitutions against the Dominion fleet coming the wormhole, the fight wouldn't last long. XO, lets talk. We need to get ready for dinner tonight" She said as she walked into her ready room, Kim following.

Time passed quickly, as did the preparations for the meeting. Jack Taylor wasn't sure how it would turn out, but with them being armed, he felt a little better. He was still amazed on how the Bellerophon didn't detect a weapons lock on her. He guessed that targeting systems and such must have gotten pretty good 130 years into the future, but then, who knows what kind of threats the Federation and Starfleet has to face in the future. Taylor contacted Starfleet about Endeavour and what her Captain asked, they notified him that they had launched a small task force to support him should Endeavour ended up being hostile. Nero and the Narada were still fresh in many Starfleet Admirals minds and the Vengeance Incident didn't help. It fueled the flames of suspicion of every officer in Starfleet for about a year or two. Everyone had to walk on eggshells and undergo vigorous tests in order to remain in command or to receive command of a starship.

Taylor had checked the ships computer on this "Dominion" but found nothing. So, as such, he contacted Starfleet. They had nothing on them, then Starfleet suggested he talk to Endeavour and get the information about the Dominion from them. A novel idea, so, following orders, he contacted Endeavour. Endeavour handed over all relevant data on the Dominion in less than 20 seconds, nearly filling their own computer information storage to capacity. While waiting for 1730 hours to come along, he'd began reading about the Dominion. The Jem'Hadar he found to be fascinating, while all the same frightening. A species that is genetically created and altered to be addicted to a substance that makes them stronger, faster, quickens their reflexes, heightens their senses, allows them to ignore pain and its highly addictive. The substance is poisonous to other species except the Jem'Hadar is another plus. Prevent your enemies from taking your own troops super drug.

The Vorta clones were another interesting species, but what scared him were Changlings. A being capable of taking shape of any sentient being, insect, bird, or inanimate object. Anyone could be suspect and what measures that were taken to detect them were severe but understandable. They would be practically impossible to detect, let alone, proven to be hard to kill. Hand-to-Hand combat with these beings was out of the question since they could form new limbs, fashion existing limbs into spears or blades, utilize them as tentacles for immobilizing or choking. They were resistant to directed energy weapons unless a lot of them were used.

Jack began reading about their ships as well, namely the Jem'Hadar had massive vessels, their capital ships are over 4,000 meters in length and armed as much as a space station. He continued reading for a couple more hours before his first officer notified him it was time to beam over to the Endeavour. When he arrived at the transporter room, everyone was already there. He had a reasonable detail, consisting of two security officers, himself, his Andorian first officer Braed, his tactical officer Miles Campbell, his vulcan science officer Ms. Sliirvak, and Engineering chief Vesten, a Tellerite.

"Captain, Endeavour informed us they are ready for transport" the transporter chief said.

Taylor cleared his throat, "Energize" he said.

When he materialized on the transporter pad of Endeavour his security officers drew their phasers and looked around. In front of the pad, with her hands clasped behind her back stood Captain Alona Benson. She was in an odd looking, almost leathery material but obviously Starfleet uniform. Red splashed across her shoulders with her last named on her right chest, four gold small squares lined above her name. On her left chest read "U.F.O.P. Starfleet" with a badge of an odd-looking Constitution-class looking ship over it. She had slightly bagged looking cargo pants made out of the same materials bloused into combat boots.

'Red? She's in operations and shes in command?' Taylor thought, then 'Damn, shes a looker'

She had her coffee-with-cream colored hair pulled back into what looked like a painful looking pony tail with not a single strand out of place. She appeared young too, maybe in her mid twenties to early thirties, she was probably about 170 centimeters tall and maybe 60 kilos soaking wet. Her grey eyes seemed to miss nothing, she had an athletic build that fit her near-perfect hourglass shaped body, her fading tan didn't seem to diminish her beauty. The only flaw he could see of her heart-shaped face was a small, yet sharp nose, if you call that a flaw.

Alona stepped forward and extended her hand with a smile, "Pleased to meet you Captain Taylor" she said. Taylor noticed she had a firm grip but it was controlled, this woman was a helluva lot stronger than she appeared. Alona turned slightly and pointed out the other officers behind her, "This is my Executive Officer and First Officer Commander Harry Kim, my Ops Officer Lieutenant Morgana Drake, and my Second Officer Lt. Commander Daro Radis" All of which stepped forward and shook Taylors hand when they were introduced.

Taylor nodded and introduced his officers, "This is my First Officer Commander Braed, my Tactical Officer Lieutenant Campbell, my Science Officer Lieutenant Sliirvak, and my Chief of Engineering, Lt. Commander Vesten" All of who stepped forward and shook Alona's hand when introduced. All seemed well so far.

"Welcome Aboard, please, this way" Alona said still smiling, turned and began leading them. When they stepped out into the corridor, they were all amazed at the size of the corridors. Large enough for at least three to four humans to stand shoulder to should across, they began to follow Captain Alona to a turbolift. When the doors opened, they were again amazed at the spaciousness of the ship. The turbolift was large enough for both parties to fit into and still have space to move around a bit. When the doors shut, Alona said "Hanger Deck" and thus began the tour of the Endeavour. Vesten wanted to get a extra close look at the Warp Core of the ship, considering that Starfleet hadn't considered making a warp core like this before however, he wasn't allowed to get too close to any console or to the warp core itself. Alona said she didn't want to damage the timeline or reality further by Starfleet getting their hands on advanced technology.

The tour took a little longer than expected considering some of Taylors party wanted to look a little closer at some ships systems, but not too close. When they reached the designated dining room, it was close to 1930. The meal started promptly after they were seated. Appetizers were set out, everything from salads to species specific foods were placed on the table. Alona took a dinner roll and cut it in half, the roll was still very warm and steamed in the center as she spread some butter over it.

"So, Captain Taylor, do you think that the commanding officers of the task force that's about an hour out will get here and enjoy a meal with me as well?" Alona asked as she bit into the roll.

Not breaking stride, Taylor replied, "I'm not sure Captain, that's a lot of hot air and brass in one spot. You sure you can handle that?" he smirked.

"I used to be the chief of staff for Starfleets Chief of Starship Operations, I think I can handle it"

"So, I noticed you're wearing red Captain Benson, how are you in command when you're in the Operations department?" Campbell asked.

"Starfleet's division colors changed in the mid-2300's. Red became command, gold became operations, and blue remained as science and medical" Alona said, heads nodded.

"Tell me about yourself Captain" Taylor said.

"Heh, well I was born in 2356 on Starbase 31. My father was in Starfleet while my mother worked for Starfleet as a civilian, so I followed in my fathers footsteps. I originally wanted to be an Aerospace pilot, flying fighters and bombers but I got into Warp Theory and never looked back. I was third engineer then second engineer on my first two assignments, then I got into Starfleets Advanced Tactical school and earned degrees in Photon Mechanics and Applied Weapons Theory. Afterwards I was a tactical officer for years, then broke that up in being an Operations Officer for a tour. I went into command then and here I am, well sort of" Alona replied. Her combadge chirped.

"Bridge to Captain Benson, Bellerophons requested reinforcements have arrived. We're sending friendship messages on all frequencies and channels. We're also stating we're hosting some of the senior officers of the Bellerophon for an evening meal. Captain, the reinforcements have their weapons charged and shields up" T'saal said.

Alona tapped her combadge, "Very well, continue sending messages and remain at yellow alert Lieutenant. If they decide to get antsy and fire on us, do not return fire, just bring the shields online. Benson out"

Taylor's group looked at one another.

"Captain, your communicator is on your uniform?" Braed asked.

"Actually, its essentially for the lack of a better term, sewn into the uniform. We call it a combadge, its part of the information share that we're authorized to give. The uniform jackets you see us wearing also is a light body armor, they can take a few phaser shots at high settings and are capable of resisting stun settings on most small arms" Kim said.

"To changed the subject, Captain, I noticed you don't have a recreation deck on board. On long voyages, how do your people remain preoccupied when not on duty?" Sliirvak asked.

"We have several recreational facilities aboard, such as a library, an extensive gymnasium with weight training facilities for a variety of species, also there are hand-to-hand combat mats for a variety of martial arts such as anbo-jytsu, Mak'bara, and Suus Mahna, gymnastics equipment, a small track, ancient weapons for weapons training when there isn't a phaser on hand and others disciplines. Theres also a phaser range for keeping proficient in small arms, then theres the holosuites and holodecks" Alona said.  
"Holosuites? Holodecks?" Taylor asked.

Radis smiled, "Captain, when we're finished eating, how about we show you the wonders of holotechnology"


	2. Chapter 2, Preparations - Part 1

_Captains Personal Log, Stardate...October 4th, 2261. The Starfleet of this reality has made leaps and bounds since I have shared some computer technology, weapons technology, ease-of-life technology, and holotechnology with them. A month ago, Starfleet Academy introduced new holotechnology courses, replicator programming and repair courses, and advanced computing courses. Two weeks after we'd arrived, Starfleet made a decision, a full 35 years ahead of implementation, they introduced a new section of Starfleet: The Starfleet Advanced Starship Design Bureau, it even has its own special agents. Dr. Novana has allowed a very light and slow trickle of new medical innovations to Starfleet Medical. Last week, per request of Starfleet Chief of Starship Operations requested/ordered that I promote everyone on board one full paygrade, myself included. I would be promoted by Starfleet CSO to Rear Admiral. I was flattered, but I declined the promotion under the premise that the only person that could promote me to Rear Admiral was Admiral Janeway. Regardless, they gave it to me. Harry jokes with me by calling me Admiral from time to time, but he understood why I declined the promotion. I did, however, promote most of the crew, including a few of the senior officers. Lt. Bari was excited when I handed her plans from the PADD Q gave me. Apparently, Admiral Janeway wanted to give me a bit of a leg up, so she had included the final uprate of the Sovereign-class that SASDB had came up with. Interesting enough, the uprate we were able to do here within two months under the Lt Bari's watchful eye. The upgrades and such I will not get into in this log entry and can be found in a previous Captain's Log. Today, Starfleet wants me to run the bridge crews of 40 various vessels that Starfleet is calling the "Counter-Dominion Task Force", essentially the fleet that will be assisting us in defeating the incoming Dominion fleet, through the gauntlet. So, I have decided that we'll run it under simulation via the holodeck at Starfleet Academy, I'll be departing in a couple of hours._

_I hope to god, we'll get more than 40 ships, because if memory serves me, the estimates were several hundred to a few thousand Dominion vessels in that reinforcement fleet, a fact I have told both the Federation Council and Starfleet Command. I know though, if we fail, we'll die here, but if we can succeed, even to the point of just holding them off maybe, just maybe, we go home. I am also hoping that the slight changes in this reality is enough to throw the Dominion off their game._

It was a bright late-fall morning in San Fransisco, the air was crisp, light, yet already warm. Alona had just beamed down to the Academy and already, she felt exhausted. She smiled to herself, thinking that she was probably the only Starfleet officer who didn't want to be called "Admiral" and got occasionally got irritated when called such. Regardless, to keep things smoothed over and to appease this reality of Starfleets upper command, she wore the Rear Admiral pip and responded to being called Admiral. Alona let out a small sigh, as she walked through the outside grounds of the Academy on her way to the newly built "Christopher Pike Holocenter", acknowledging the constant "Good Morning Admiral" from practically every cadet and trainee at the Academy.

Stepping through the doors, she returned the salute to Admiral Falon Oswald, the current Chief of Starship Operations or CSO, "Morning Alona, you look tired" he said.

"I had a long night, is everyone here?" Alona said.

"Not yet, we're still waiting on Captain Turin, Captain Ferris, Captain Vehs, and Captain Taylor. Here" Oswald said, handing her a steaming cup. Alona cocked an eyebrow.

"Cappuccino"

"Ah" she said and took a sip. She remembered that Admiral Oswald was not a big fan of coffee either. Like Alona, he would drink it but not religiously as some other officers that came to mind.

"How's the Dreadnought - er, the Titan-types coming along?" Alona asked.

"Well, considering that they're already armed to the teeth all so in order to make it a starship we had to remove some automation for installing science labs, holodecks, and housing for the additional personnel. Regardless they still use less people than your average Constitution-type and we've already built three already, the fourth will be ready at the end of the month. As big as they are we're still dumping everything that the Mars, Saturn and Neptune shipyards have into those things and we're still doing uprates and refits on starships but those are coming along a helluva lot faster than those Titans" Oswald said.

Alona nodded, she had read about the Vengeance Incident and inquired about the Dreadnought-class they were talking about. Upon being shown the schematics of the ship, she asked if they were building any of them. When Oswald had said no, she almost slapped him. The firepower that these ships had is both potent and plentiful, which meant that this class of ship could be the Federations savior. To restart the program, Alona had gotten a hold of and reworked some of its blueprints of the ship to include science, recreational, and humanitarian facilities on board as well as additional weapons emplacements, enhanced sensors and shields, and sturdier armor with better placement. Lastly, she suggested specific materials in which to build the ship, saving some resources in the construction process, then she reclassed it as a starship and labeled it the Titan-type. After that, Alona handed the plans over to Admiral Oswald who loved it and put it forth to the newly implemented Starfleet Advanced Starship Design Bureau for consideration of construction.

The result was a resounding yes from SASDB. Of their own accord, Starfleet had all their shipyards to halt production on all classes of vessels except for the Constitution-type and those within a month or so of completion to begin construction of the new Titan-type. Refits we're still going on at the yards found at Titan, Europa, and Io to include the new technologies Starfleet had received from Endeavours database. When Alona thought about it, as of yesterday, the refit yards had been able to refit and repair more than 38 ships in the time it took the yards to build three Titan-types, although she understood why. The Titan-types were monstrous, still retaining their original U.S.S. Vengeance size of nearly 1,400 meters long. The ships were resource intensive to a point but also, in her opinion, to which she voiced to both Starfleet Command and the Federation Council, it was the only real vessel Starfleet had that is capable of fending off the Dominion. While the SASDB could probably come up with a new starship design to do the same that a Titan could, starship projects had to be initiated, designed, worked, reworked, simulated, tested, then a test ship built for trials, then probably stripped and rebuilt because of problems found in the test ship before true production of the class starts. A process that could span several years, time of which Starfleet did not have.

With a little over 80% of Starfleets new starship yard force building Titans, Alona was surprised on how many they had been about to turn out and crew within such a short period. When the Endeavour had arrived at Earth, Starfleet had been preparing to begin Reductions in Force. Since the Vengeance Incident proved the threat of war with the Klingons was fabricated, Starfleet found themselves overstaffed by almost 20% in all departments. But, with the construction of the Titan-types, Starfleet found a place to put the additional personnel.

An aide came up and whispered into Admiral Oswalds ear, he nodded at the aide, "Good" he said, then turned to Alona.

"Lets get them into the briefing room, theres a continiential breakfast in there for various species in there if the're hungry" he said, Alona nodded.

Captain Turnin and Captain Vehs beamed in with their respective bridge crews a few feet away, then Captain Ferris and her crew a moment later. She chuffed, 'Fashionably late' she thought. She turned back to the crowd standing in the atrium with her, then stood on a nearby chair. Everyone was talking, generally cheerful too, but quieted down as she stood up.

"Everyone, please head into the main briefing room, Admiral Oswald has informed me that there is a multi-species continiental breakfast in there, so help yourself. We're waiting on Captain Taylor, then we'll start the briefing, afterwards, we'll get the simulation started" Alona said, then stepped off the chair and ended up leading the crowd into Briefing Room 1. A few moments after everyone had settled into snacking on some food and drink, Captain Taylor and his bridge crew came in. He nodded at Alona when he entered.

Out of all the officers in this reality, he was the only other officer that understood why she declined the promotion to Admiral. He also didn't call her Admiral, at least in private. In most public settings he followed decorum, as expected. Their relationship was similar to the one she had with Nathan Taylor, casual, if not a little flirty, but friendly most of the time. He spoke his mind and almost acted like a pseudo-aide in most cases when they were in public or on the bridges of their respective ships, however, amongst their senior officers or in their ready rooms they referred to each other by their first names and dropped most formalities.

Taylor had told Alona that she still treated him like a person of equal rank, not as a superior and that he liked that so he did the same. She swallowed a swig of cappuccino and stepped up to the podium of the briefing room. She tapped the microphone, the dull thumping catching everyones attention.

"Please, if you can find a seat or stand, it doesn't matter" She said, then waiting a couple polite moments before continuing.

"Ok, the original idea was to pit all of your ships against Endeavour in a simulated test against a superior foe, however, I explained to Admiral Oswald that we're going to do something slightly different. This holodeck has been programmed with everyones starship, their bridges and how their ships react, move, fire weapons and so on, including the Endeavour. What we'll be doing is a simulated reactive combat against the Dominion fleet coming out of the wormhole.

"Now, a few quick words, remember that this is a simulation, nothing more. There's no personnel grading, we're looking to see how well each ship handles against technologically superior foes. We're going to be supported by an additional hundred or so computer generated and controlled starships, mainly because we're waiting on the Office of Starship Operations to clear the additional ships we require" Alona said, then eye'd Admiral Oswald with a smile, everyone chuckled.

"After the tech simulation test, we're actually going to work out tactics, plans and during the course of the test we'll throw in twists, things we didn't plan for and so on. We're going to be seeing how well we work together as a fleet against these guys. Since this is the first real time we're going to be working together, its a good thing we're doing this under simulations. With the first test, I want everyone to know, our goal isn't to win but to test out how well the technological improvements we've made equate to the Dominions of the time. We're going to be here for quite a while people, we'll stop for breaks and meals, so...everyone into the Holodeck" Alona said. And so, her long day began.

The initial testing of how well the technological improvements Starfleet had made since the "exchange program" she had started proved useful. The extra defenses helped a lot but whenever a Dominion Battleship had appeared it wiped the floor with with all of the starships except the Titan-types which were able to withstand most of the incoming fire before being critically damaged. The only ship that generally came out of combat heavily damaged but still capable of fighting is the Endeavour. Expected but still, unfortunate. Alona knew that there were battleships in the that reinforcement fleet, so she decided that when the battleships make it out of the wormhole to leave it to Endeavour and the Titans, while the rest of the ships continued engaging the other Dominion vessels. No point in risking vessels that couldn't withstand the firepower of a battleship before severely damaging the battleship.

In the tactics test everyone worked equally well together, within a simulated fleet action. Surprisingly, no cliques had formed between the crews of the ships, something Alona had expected may happen. The results pleased her, in that regard she called a conference with Admiral Oswald. Unfortunately, he was unavailable until tomorrow. She sighed. She tapped her combadge.

"Benson to U.S.S. Cook, one to beam up"

Shimmering blue light filled her vision, then she was standing on the runabout transporter pad. LTjg Kolaas turned to see Alona beamed aboard.

"Welcome aboard Captain" he said.

"Thanks, lets head back to Endeavour" Alona said and sat down in the co-pilots seat.

She felt even more exhausted, 14 hours in the holodeck simulating combating Dominion Forces had drained her even more. Starfleet had stationed Endeavour in an ultra-low orbit over Mercury. Both planet and moon were uninhabited due to no useful metals or materials were found on planet and most ships that were studying Sol simply warped past Mercury to look closer at the star.

They were at warp for only a few minutes before they dropped out and Endeavour came into view. She looked majestic, the light of the sun made her hull glimmer like a grey-white gem. Kolaas entered in a command.

"Endeavour, this is U.S.S. Cook requesting landing authorization. Endeavour Actual is on board and sends regards" he said.

"Permission granted, platform three is available in the primary bay" a voice replied.

After they landed, Kim met Alona at the turbolift, "You look like shit" when she gave him the bird he smiled, "How'd it go?" he asked.

Alona shook her head, "I don't think we'll have the ships to combat them. Hell, the ships we have can barely handle a small Dominion force and to be honest, I don't know how to help them without really fucking this timeline up" she said as they entered the turbolift.

"Captain's Quarters" she said and the lift began humming its way there.

"We could give them the schematic for a ship, something small and has limited use, like a Defiant-class" Kim said.

She understood he was speaking hypothetically, tossing ideas around as they try to figure this out. She shook her head again, "No, even handing over schematics for such a ship could seriously screw up the timeline of this reality, I don't want to damage it further"

"Ma'am...permission to speak freely"

"Harry, you can always speak to me freely"

The lift stopped and the doors opened, Alona followed Kim out of the turbolift. They didn't speak until they entered her quarters, "Alona, this timeline has been seriously tampered with already, 25 years worth of tampering to be exact. In fact we've tampered with this timeline ourselves by handing over a little advanced technology. What worse can we do if we hand over the schematic for a ship?" Kim asked.

"Plenty, especially with a Defiant-class starship. They may be small but they pack enough firepower to knock down Excelsior-class starships and seriously damage Galaxy-class starships, not to mention they can take a pounding too. In this reality, they haven't even discovered some other Federation member species, take the Boleans for example. Also, we need to maintain moral guidelines somewhere, I will make sure we maintain our own time and realities laws, regulations and directives" Alona said as she stepped over to the replicator.

"Pot Roast with Brown Gravy, Corn on the Cob, green beans and mashed potatoes on the side. Root Beer to drink" Alona said, then looked at Kim.

"I've already had dinner" he said.

"Want something to drink?" she asked.

"Sure, I'll have what you're having"

"Make that two Root Beers" She picked up the tray and set it down on her desk then handed over one of the root beers to Kim and took a seat.

Alona looked over her tray but before she began eating, she looked up at Kim, "Don't mind me, I know you're hungry, please, dig in" he said, she did so.

"We've already violated the Temporal Prime Directive when we told them we were from the future and we've broken it several times since by giving them technology they didn't have" Kim said.

"We had no choice in that regard, this timelines technology would be no match to the Dominion, they would be easily swept aside. We have to even the playing field as much as we can, but I will not flagrantly violate the Temporal Prime Directive anytime it pleases me. Someone has to take a stand and say no"

Kim nodded, "I understand, I was just saying, by giving them something that would help us as much as them, a leg up of sorts. How about this: lets dig into our database and say hand over schematics for an Excelsior or perhaps a Constitution-class refit. They'd be just receiving this technology say 10 to 20 or so years ahead of schedule. I don't think we'd be damaging the timeline much, especially since we showed them how to create type-8 and type-9 phaser turrets" he said.

Alona was chewing a mouthful, she glanced away in thought and leaned back. It's a thought, hell the refit should be already in the works to be approved to begin with. The Excelsior-class could be the same way, the only difference would be she would include the Lakota uprate that never went through. The U.S.S. Lakota was refitted Excelsior that was modified as an experimental uprate that was unfortunately pressed into firing on the U.S.S. Defiant when some senior officers at Starfleet HQ were attempting to forcefully militarize Starfleet. While the Lakota proved to be a strong opponent, the Defiant easily outmatched her, so the Lakota uprate was shelved in favor of faster producing Defiant-class starships for the Dominion War rather than using a lot of resources to refit all the Excelsior's.

Here though, a Lakota uprate could prove to be very effective, same with having say using the type-3 Constitution-refit uprate might prove to be just enough for Starfleet to handle the threat from the wormhole. Problem is, they wouldn't be able to build an Excelsior, not right away at least, all the work they are putting out is to produce as many Titan-types as they could. The refits on the other hand might just be the trick. The refit yards were working full tilt since most of the construction crews have gone to the Titans, perhaps it might work well for the Constitutions. She nodded.

"I think the Constitution refits might actually work out, giving them a new ship to build is kind of out the question at the moment. Look at what their doing with the Titans" Alona said.

"I think we should just give them the schematics and let them do what they want with them, they use some of their technology different here too. A thing to remember" Kim said then stood.

"I'll let you finish your dinner, we can talk some more tomorrow" he said.

"I don't think so, Admiral Oswald wants to meet with me to tomorrow. I'll bring the refit plans with me, he'll probably run them through the bureau first but thats where they can make the changes to the plans all they want. From there, I have meetings with the bureau, then another battery of simulations. The next few weeks are going to be brutal, I'll need you to back me up as much as you can please"

"Always. Get some sleep Alona, you look like shit" he said with a smile, then left.


	3. Chapter 3, Preparations - Part 2

**_Authors Note: I apologize to everyone for taking so long to publish this chapter, recently I went through the first book re-edited it and cleaned it up (It was so rocky!) so heres the latest installment of Endeavour and her crew._**

* * *

_Captains Log, October 28th, 2261. Admiral Oswald and his team never ceases to amaze me. In just a couple short weeks, he and the SASDB have taken the Constitution-class refit plans I gave them and churned out new ideas just on those plans alone, such as a vertical warp core, similar to our own, advanced starship shielding, and upgraded photon torpedos. In addition to the new ideas, they have implemented several dozen changes to the plans to fit the Constitutions they have right now, also to fit the technology they have on hand._

_ Since seeing all these new innovations they are coming up with just from seeing plans for a starship that hasn't been seen by any of my people in over 80 years, I think I am going to stop giving them new technologies and let them fend for their own now. Some would say I have seriously violated the Temporal Prime Directive and probably a couple other dozen regulations, however, when I think about it, most of these innovations are necessary, to combat the threat looming from the Bajoran Wormhole. Admiral Oswald informed me as of yesterday, another 8 ships have been added to the task force, pushing our numbers to 79, but in all honesty, 79 isn't nearly enough. Out of those 8, three are Titan-types, we'll need more Titans than jus three in order to keep to our combat plans. I just keep hoping we get the necessary ships we need before they come through the wormhole, because if they came through now, we'd wouldn't have a snowballs chance in hell in beating them. As of today, I've been ordered to take command of the task force at Uranus._

Endeavour rose gracefully and slowly broke orbit from Mercury, almost as if she was drifting. When she had cleared Mercury's gravity well, Kolaas had plotted several "short warp jumps" to quickly go through the Sol system, her destination: Uranus. Going to warp while in a planetary system is dangerous, due to the gravity wells that a planet has, however, short jumping or short hopping, meaning they jump to warp for a few seconds to a couple minutes at a time to clear a large planetary systems such as Sol, is relatively safe as long as the plots were correct. You didn't want to come out of warp in a gravity well or even in an atmosphere, namely because of subspace interference or not being able to maintain a stable warp field in a natural gravity well, also not being designed for atmospheric reentry causes problems as well.

Alona thought about finding time to put to the test the new Quantum Slipstream Drive. They wouldn't be able to use it in this case however she thought about making jumps to Vulcan and back in the next couple of days. Most new 24th century Starfleet starships are being built with and some being refitted with a Quantum Slipstream Drive, in addition to a standard warp drive. Starfleet had been testing them on older in-service starships and to some of them, the ship literately flew apart so they had been making upgrades to some older starships spaceframes. While some Sovereigns were being retrofitted with these new drives not all of them had them, some of the older Sovereigns were having issues with the drive. It was said that the Narada and the Jellyfish had a Quantum Slipstream Drive, but neither were verified.

Admiral Oswald had ordered Alona over to officially take command of the Counter-Dominion Task Force, which was massing in orbit of Uranus. In addition to assuming command of the task force, Endeavour was to put the new upgrades to Endeavour to the test as well. While some of the uprate was done at a specially designed dock at Io, most was completed while orbiting Mercury. Endeavours uprate involved the quiet installation of the Quantum Slipstream Drive, installation of a "Replimat", basically a large space with several small, medium and large replicators and a seating area with tables. All the replicators programmed with everything from food to clothing, to replacement parts for the ship, to jewelry, money or whatever else that someone could want, that could be replicated was easily found there. Other smaller upgrades were a couple additional phaser arrays along the aft-dorsal side of the warp nacelles and updates to LCARS and other computer systems aboard.

"Course plotted Captain, the QSD is active and standing by" Kolaas said.

"Very well, lets make the short hop to Earth's L5 Lagrange point with the standard Warp Drive Mr. Kolaas" Alona said.

"Aye ma'am, engaging warp in 5...4...3...2...1"

Within a few seconds they had already passed Venus. After about 45 seconds of travel, Kolaas dropped the ship out of warp and they appeared in Earths L5 Lagrange point as plotted.

"Captain, why don't we use the QSD for the these short hops?" Kolaas asked.

"Because you wouldn't be able to disengage the drive fast enough for us to arrive at our target locale. Consider this: If we were used the QSD for 2 minutes straight, we'd cross an entire sector of space, we'd cross the Sol system in about .28 seconds of Quantum Slipstream flight Lieutenant, maybe even less" Bari said.

"Damn" Alona said with a smile, it hadn't really occurred to her about how fast Quantum Slipstream flight really was, "How long are we able to maintain the field?" she asked.

"For a maximum of 10 minutes, the ships computer will then automatically shut it down for safety reasons. Endeavour was never really designed for something like this, let alone did anyone even think of something like the QSD. Eventually, we might be able to mantain the field for maybe an hour or so but that's after extensive testing of the drive and study of Endeavours outer hull and spaceframe. If we were say one of those new Vesta's or even one of those Chimeras everyone was talking about we'd be able to maintain the field for much, much, much longer, like weeks or months" Bari said, she was sitting at her Engineers station, "Don't misunderstand me, in 10 minutes we can cross five sectors of space easily, so it might be good to use while we're in pursuit of someone of if we have to get somewhere fast. We can still maintain a max warp speed of 9.997 for several hours though" she added.

Alona shook her head, amazed, "Continue with standard warp jumps Mr. Kolaas" she said.

"Aye ma'am"

20 minutes later, Endeavour assumed a standard orbit over Uranus, surrounded by the Counter-Dominion Task Force, also at various levels of orbit over the gas giant. Tradition and hoopla not withstanding, Alona assumed command via hailing frequencies. Afterwards, as ordered, the U.S.S. Atlas, the newest Titan-type built departed, her destination: relief of the Minnesota, the vessel currently keeping watch over the Bajoran Wormhole. The flight to the Bajoran Wormhole would take about three days at warp, something Alona had been fighting Starfleet to have the task force moved to orbiting Bajor or perhaps someplace as close.

The idea was to have the task force within a few minutes warp flight to the wormhole, to act as a reactionary, close by defensive force, capable of striking hard, fast and capable of warping a few minutes out of the combat zone for repairs. Unfortunately, Starfleet was dragging its heels about establishing a Starbase that far out into space, stating that they didn't have any stations out that far. After a little bit of research, Alona found out that Starfleet had not established a Deep Space Station program of any sort. So, against her better judgement, she did divulge a little more extra information about the Deep Space Station program and some information on all the Deep Space Stations 24th century Starfleet had.

Two weeks after she shared the information, with Admiral Oswald pushing the issue, Starfleet decided to establish its first Deep Space Station, located in the unclaimed and uninhabited Trivas system, labeling the station Deep Space Starbase One or DSS1. The choice of location was due to the fact that Bajorans, in the last thousand years or so, have not advanced much in warp propulsion with ships only capable of a maximum warp speed of warp three. With that in mind and the fact that Bajor did not have many warp capable ships built to begin with, Starfleet did not want to establish anything within Bajoran space to adhere to the Prime Directive. While the Trivas system was within a Bajoran ships reasonable warp range, the system was uninhabited and unclaimed because there was nothing but gas giants in the planetary systems, their moons contained nothing of note, making the system a wonderful choice to establish a semi-out-of-the-way Deep Space Station.

The Station would take quite some time to build, however, it allowed Alona to again request to move the CDTF to a closer location to the wormhole, as such she was approved. It also allowed Starfleet Corps of Engineers to construct the station in relative peace, because of such a sizable force already in place. The same force also allowed the Corps of Engineers to accelerate their time table in the stations construction by nearly two years since Alona had authorized them to take some people from each ships company, with the exception of the Endeavour, to build it. While Bari and her department had offered their services, Alona denied the request because she didn't want an accidental divulgence of information or technology by a forgotten tricorder or by crewmen talking amongst themselves. This was something she had explained to Captain Taylor who in turn explained to the other captains of the task force. A few of the Captains still had reservations about the Endeavour and her crew, Captain Taylor was able to explain to them so they understood the reasons why Endeavour didn't participate much or at all in many things.

Over a period of three months, with the construction crews working non-stop, around half of the station had been built. The station itself resembling Earth Spacedock that Endeavour and her crew remember from their reality. Spacedock 1 currently in orbit around Earth in this reality resembled something close to an oversized Regula-class station than anything, at least to Endeavour's crew. With the CDTF being much closer to the wormhole, it allowed the rotations of ships watching the wormhole to be a lot shorter than the original two to four month watch the watch was shortened to one month per ship. However, in the last two months, Endeavour monitored the wormhole with another rotating ship. This month it was the U.S.S. Athena, another Titan-type. Alona's thought was having Endeavour out of sight, kept her out of mind with those who were helping construct DSS1, thus those few Captains that had reservations about Endeavour and her crew were not stirred up by her presence.

Alona had run a several "Recall and Run" drills with the task force, to time and see how fast the task force could recall its personnel from the construction and haul ass to the wormhole. The first few times were horrid, with some ships nearly taking almost an hour to get all its personnel back aboard and to warp to the wormhole. Over time though, they had slowly whittled it down to around 15 minutes to get everyone back aboard. It became generally accepted that if you weren't back aboard in 15 minutes you were left behind to assist the stations personnel with preparing triage centers. DSS1's small hospital had already been built and staffed, only with 137 bio-beds available, the hospital had begun to set up a couple triage centers in some cargo bays expanding their capabilities. While sickbays aboard the ships would be taking the brunt of the combat casualties, there were some facilities on DSS1 that starship sickbays didn't have, such as a couple medical research laboratories and more extensive operating rooms.

Endeavour drifted slowly, her sensors trained on the wormhole, neutrino emissions were normal with the occasional spike, where the wormhole would open for a short moment at intervals that T'saal said resembled something like a humanoid coughing. These "coughing fits" would happen randomly, but never did something come out of the wormhole. Ever since Alona witnessed the "coughing fits" she had decided to see if there was a way to see if their was a way to stabilize it so it would be easier to detect any ships coming out of it.

She knew that last time, it took Captain Sisko being picked as the Emissary to stabilize it, but she thought there might be another way. Not in so much as to forcefully stabilize it, but maybe something to as Radis simply put, "to give it a hypo to alleviate its coughing". The unfortunate part was that Starfleet from both realities have never really attempted to physically stabilize a wormhole like this one. Attempts of making artificial wormholes have been futile, all ending in failure or resulting in the destruction of the ship attempting to generate the artificial wormhole. In the end, Alona decided that stabilizing the wormhole would be pointless. They weren't going to traverse it, just intercept what comes out of it.

Kim chimed her ready room and entered when he was allowed. He had a few PADDs with him, most of which were normal shipboard reports. He had a couple older PADDs with reports from the DSS1 construction teams and the officers appointed to run the station. Apparently, they didn't have a chain of command to follow past the commanding officer of the station, so as such, they reported to Alona being she was the highest ranking officer in the area and the fact she was the one who established the Deep Space Station Program. It was something she didn't like but she accepted the responsibility, at least until Starfleet got the Deep Space Station program fully up and running.

"Morning Alona, got the latest reports on the ship, the wormhole and..." he held up the two older PADDs, "DSS1s construction and officers reports" Kim said.

Alona was behind her desk, already littered with PADDs for various ongoing projects. She smirked, took one of the PADDs Kim added, and began reading it, "Thanks Harry, I assume you've read the one from Captain Briggs?"

"Yes ma'am. Captain Briggs is happy to report that DSS1's construction timeline has accelerated again"

"Let me guess, the station will be completed in a week and a half to two weeks, three on the outside" Alona said glancing up, she was smiling.

Kim smiled back and nodded "Yep, also he's also reported that several species, ships, and supplies are arriving daily. These species are trading all over the station and its effecting the construction crews almost to the point of where they are hampering the construction of the station. It's already become a trading hub with the Federation and nearby systems"

"Send a message to Captain Briggs, see if he can designate an area somewhere on the station where all the trading can happen. Yes, I understand that trading will happen all over the station, but at least the bulk of it can be confined to a certain area, that way construction won't be hampered by traders. How's the station handling the ship traffic?" she asked as she went back to reading the PADD.

"As far as reports we've received, it seems the station is handling the starship traffic quite well. Captain Briggs also reports that the last of his senior staff has arrived and have been briefed. Recently we've received message traffic from Briggs with a request to the Corps of Engineers to establish some nearby repair slips and repair docks as well as outer defense weapons platforms that can be remote controlled. We've received another message to Starship Operations requesting to have a starship permanently stationed at the station for use by the station staff. The nature of the request and the way he worded it made me think that he's read about DS9 and he wants his own Defiant. He asked for something like an Armstrong-type or a Mayflower-type, nothing too big"

Alona's head snapped up, her brows furrowing, "God Dammit. OSI is supposed to make sure shit like this doesn't happen, their in charge of the information we've given Starfleet and the Federation. How the hell did he get his hands on that?"

"Haven't a clue, I've asked Morgana and Daro to look into it. See if Briggs has contacts in OSI or if theres a leak somewhere. We'll find out, about his requests though, Starfleet is stating hes under hes under your command, so they want to know if you're going to approve them or not. They've been pressing the issue"

"I think its a great idea for the construction slips considering that the stations repair services are kind of limited. I don't mind the extra defense platforms, but that starship request, tell them that I am leaving that up to Admiral Oswald" Alona said with a sigh then, "Have you read the Engineer's Report?" she asked holding the PADD up.

"No, why?"

"She's had to replicate and replace another 59 burnt out plasma conduits and 12 EPS junctions"

"Another 59? That's what 200 or 300 this month?"

"314"

"Why are they getting burnt out so often? I know we're in the same boat as other Sovereign's, EPS problems but, usually its not because their getting burnt out"

"We're like other Sovereigns where we have problems with available power, but in our case its too much available power over not having enough. Its a position I'd rather be in than not having enough. Bari and I have determined that the that new fangled HEAPWC is just that, fucking efficient. We've bled some of the extra power to various systems that benefit from having extra power like charging emergency batteries, shields and phasers but its still not enough. We have so much extra available power that its near red-lining all of our plasma conduits, the EPS mains and junctions found throughout the ship. The taps aren't cutting it too, they can't bleed the power fast enough. We've tried to see if we could see if the warp core could produce less power, to our delight we found that it had, however in that case the core didn't produce enough power so theres no middle ground with the thing. Basically Harry, they stuck an overpowered warp core in a ship that needs one but not one this powerful, she can barely handle it. The installation of the QSD helped but not as much as we hoped.

"Of course with the power conduits being near the red line makes them even more susceptible to exploding but theres nothing else we can do. I've tasked her with seeing if she can design a new type of plasma and EPS conduits that can handle the load but she hasn't reported anything on it yet. I've been thinking about heading down, seeing if I can help her with it and kinda kick her in the ass to concentrate on the project. I'm worried that we'll lose critical power in a sustained firefight, with the Dominion coming through the wormhole we're going to get into a sustained fight" Alona finished.

Kim nodded. Sometime in the mid-2380s, Kim remembered that there was a study on Plasma conduits and EPS junctions and how they were a serious contributor to injuries aboard a starship. The findings were mostly inconclusive, however, it was found that both were susceptible to exploding in many circumstances such as battle damage or being near certain energy sources. Its been something Starfleet has been looking into, making newer, more durable EPS mains, plasma conduits and stronger taps, while Endeavour is not equipped with them, Pathfinder-class starships are supposed to have some sort of advanced type of Plasma conduit that's more durable. Unfortunately, Endeavour's database had no Pathfinder schematics available for using their advanced plasma conduits for a template.

"Do you think we can fabricate a new one? We're basically creating a brand new type of system almost right?" Kim asked.

"In a way we are yes..." Alona trailed off as she continued reading the Engineer's report, then "Bari is also seeing if we can perform more tests on the QSD. I don't blame her, we need to do some more tests on the system"

"I'll get to scheduling some time in" Kim said and looked out her bay window. The Wormhole opened for a moment, then closed, then opened again but this time it stayed open. He stood and walked over to the window.

"Captain?" Kim said.

Alona looked up at Kim, then out the window. She also stood and came to the window, watching the aperture of the wormhole for any sign of a ship coming out. Kim and Alona looked at each other a moment, both then turned and headed into the bridge.

"Status" Alona said as she stepped onto the bridge.

T'saal stood from the Captain's Chair he was occupying, "The Wormhole is remaining open, however we're not detecting any vessel exiting it, sensors indicate no vessels are inside that we can tell, however, our scans are limited when we're scanning into the wormhole" he said as he stepped aside and Alona sat.

"Can we get close and see if we can get a visual inside?" she asked.

"I wouldn't suggest it, the wormhole is unstable. I don't think getting closer would give us any extra information we don't have" T'saal said.

"Very Well, Helmsman, take us in, ahead one-quarter impulse power. Inform the Athena to remain here but standby to tractor us if need be"

"Aye ma'am"

Endeavour slowly edged her way in, her sensors sweeping, probing, trying to penetrate the fog of neutrinos to see if theres anything inside the wormhole. Alona thought it may be a feeble attempt at scanning but it didn't hurt. She made sure Endeavour was at least 100,000 kilometers from the mouth of the wormhole, while trying to position the Endeavour to where they could visually peer inside. Remarkably, the Wormhole continued to remain open, as if a ship was entering it or exiting it.

After 20 minutes of edging, adjusting, and positioning, Alona finally got Endeavour in place to peer inside. Inside it looked like what the Wormhole looked like back in their reality, except the energies inside were in turmoil, electric like arcs of energy jumping around inside. Flashes of light in all the colors of the rainbow, green-blue tubes of energy whipped about like an uncontrolled fire hose. Flickers of dark shadows deep within the wormhole is what caught Alona's eye.

"Anyone else see the the dark shadows near the back" she asked aloud, she had stood and took a couple steps forward to get a better look.

"Where?" Radis asked.

"I think so, full magnification in quadrant 22.43" Drake said, T'saal entered a couple commands and a pair of lines formed a square in the quadrant she said on the viewscreen, then it zoomed in.

It was almost out the field of view, the shadows zoomed up to appear to be dark shapes, that Alona had seen, "Computer, super-impose an outline of a Dominion Battleship over the dark shape displayed on the viewscreen" Kim said.

A green outline of a Dominion Battleship appeared over the dark shape, but didn't quite match it.

"Computer, run through the database of known Dominion vessels until there is a match of vessel profile over the silhouette on the viewscreen" Drake said.

Green outlines began to spin through and finally stopped with the computer giving a 87.975% match of a Dominion Battlecruiser. Alona turned around and looked at the rest of her senior staff, all of which looked at her. She looked back over her shoulder at the silhouette match, then back at her staff.

"We'll convene in half an hour, I don't think they'll be coming through today. Computer return the viewscreen to normal. Mr. Kolaas, put us around 5000 kilometers from the Athena please" she said, sitting in her chair.

Alona almost didn't believe it. Q was right.


End file.
